WARNING: It's Complicated
by thegenuineimitation
Summary: Harry returns changed from an interesting summer vacation away from the Dursleys just in time for the Quidditch World Cup. Little does he know that his life is about to get more interesting then is probably healthy. Slash (M/M/M). Challenge Response.
1. Chapter 1

**WARNING: It's Complicated**

**Chapter One: What I Do with My Vacation Time is My Business**

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Harry Potter.

**Author's Note:** Hey guys, me again! Yes, I am starting another project. No, why would I be studying for exams? This piece is my sumbmission for the "It's Complicated" - OT3 Competition on HPFC. It's Due on Feb. 13th so anyone who wants to help me keep up with the updating by sending me encouraging reviews or PMs or suggesting plot points. Go right ahead. I'll love you forever!

TIME JUMP: The Year is 2004 (cause I wanna include modern tech and fashion).

**WARNINGS: **If you look at the rating you'll see this fic is rated M. Some content may not be suitable for younger viewers. This story will definitely contain Slash (M/M/M), don't like don't read, and violence. And it will also contain mentions of under-aged smoking, drinking, and sex. You have been warned.

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Most people would probably be terrified in this kind of situation, Harry thought to himself as he sprinted away from a small moaning pack of zombies he'd inadvertently attracted. In fact he probably should be terrified, but this was becoming an alarmingly commonplace circumstance ever since he'd come to the Black Forest.

He was alive and a zombie's meal of choice was living flesh. There were zombies living, or rather being dead and walking around anyway, in the Black Forest. Harry was living in the black forest. It was a basic two and two equals four thing.

He'd cut his hand on a rock earlier. He'd been taking down his tent when one of the trees had moved a fraction of an inch. He'd tripped over the root, thrown his hand out and BAM! A bloody slash three inches long. It took all of fifteen minutes for every zombie within a quarter mile to be drawn to the fresh blood-scent.

They weren't too fast, the zombies, none of them were newly made and most of their muscles had already been consumed by the virus that kept their corpse upright but zombies had incredible stamina, seeing as how not getting enough air, cramping muscles and other physical limits didn't bother them. There was also the issue of the moaning. The moaning would attract even more zombies and if enough zombies were drawn here a mob would form and wouldn't that just be the icing on the cake.

The thing about zombies was the more of them there were, the more difficult it became to escape, they developed a kind of gang intelligence and suddenly became capable of setting up traps and ambushes, and the more useless it became to try and kill them. Harry had gotten to be a pretty good shot with the crossbow bouncing against his hip and beheading was easy with an enchanted sword, and he had one of those in his satchel, but he wasn't under any illusions that he was skilled enough to take on a pack of—he risked a quick glance over his shoulder—nine zombies, and those were just the ones he could see chasing after him through the shadows and thick trees.

Luckily he wouldn't have to, provided, of course, he didn't screw up or die or do both at once in the next three minutes.

Drawing in a deep breath and picking his target Harry put on more speed, slowly increasing the distance between himself and the pack, until he reached the tree. For one heart stopping, lung freezing, gut clenching minute he thought he'd misjudged the height of the branch and that it was beyond his reach but adrenaline gave him strength. He jumped and curled his good hand around rough bark, using his momentum to run up the trunk of the tree and, with a grunt, managed to swing a leg over the low lying branch and haul himself up.

The fragile limb swayed and dipped alarmingly with his weight and Harry was quick to press his back against the trunk while the zombies, most of them much taller than Harry, gathered around clawed ineffectually at the dragon hide of his boots. He thanked his lucky stars that his last lover had insisted on showering him with expensive gifts. Dmitri might have been a couple of cards short of a deck but the half-vampire was pretty and he had good taste in footwear.

A zombie got a good grip on his ankle and Harry, ignoring the sudden drop of a tightly wound ball of barbed wire and icy fear into his gut, kicked it in the head, stunning it long enough to free his ankle. Harry then reached for his crossbow and, balancing carefully, shot it between the eyes. It fell, still dead but no longer moving and one of the more skeletal members of the pack bent down and started feeding on what was left of his rotting flesh. Harry shuddered at the scene and turned away making a reach for the branch above him. It was a stretch but with a little hop he was dangling from a sturdier branch another five feet above the zombies.

With a careful bit of schoolyard gymnastics Harry was soon settled on the branch well above the zombies in a pretty good position to take them out with the crossbow at his leisure as they clawed ineffectually at the trunk of the tree, well past the dexterity, coordination and intelligence necessary for climbing after him or avoiding his quarrels.

Harry paused for a moment to catch his breath and check his weapon. He glanced down at his watch. He still had about twelve minutes.

The crossbow and bolts had not been a gift from Dmitri but from his mother. Lady Sonja felt that it was prudent for anyone who frequented the Black Forest to have a weapon on hand. Given how often he'd been in need of her gift over the past month Harry was inclined to agree. Harry ran a hand over the machinery of the crossbow, making sure that nothing was damaged, and checked the tautness of the string. He re-loaded the weapon with a quarrel from the quiver at his hip.

The spelled-bolts were silver tipped and would serve him well against vampires and werewolves as well as doing the more mundane job of punching holes in the brains of zombies, revenants, ghouls and whatever else the forest decided to throw at him.

Harry could hear the low moaning carried on the wind as more zombies approached from deeper in the forest but he still wasn't really worried. He would be out of here before the mob formed he was sure. He checked his watch. Seven minutes.

He raised his crossbow at a female near the fringes of the pack, her teeth were blackened and it looked like half her face had been eaten, and took careful aim. She went down as the metal quarrel flew into her open mouth and severed her spinal column. He reloaded with another quarrel from the small quiver attached to his belt and searched out another target. Then another. He took the time to line up his shots properly and only had to take a second shot once. He had just managed to make a tricky shot and take out the last zombie in the pack, the male who was losing his nails clawing off the bark of the tree, when the portkey around his neck activated.

There was the sudden disconcerting sensation of a hook behind his navel jerking him out of his tree and into the whirling vortex that was characteristic of portkey travel and Harry found himself whisked away.

When he landed at the London Office of the Department of International Magical Travel he was unceremoniously forced through a blood test, and summarily stripped, relieved of his weapons, tent and satchel and put through decontamination, all without a word being spoken to him.

Harry wasn't offended. Anyone coming from a hot zone like the Black Forest was subject to decontamination, as well as registration if they tested positive for lycanthropy or vampirism and immediate destruction if they tested positive for the strain of virus that made zombies. Western Europe had been completely zombie free for two hundred years now and Harry could understand the precaution. He wouldn't want to be caught running from a mob of fresh made zombies in London, and the thrice-damned things would definitely spook the muggles. It made magical customs look more like a border patrol than, say, a muggle airport, but according to the pamphlets Harry had read while he was waiting to get out to Albania earlier that summer the Department hadn't had a single incidence of work related infection in the past 175 years.

His belongings and clothes were spell sanitized and then returned to him where he was waiting, naked and freezing, in a post-decontamination holding pen. He dressed quickly in a clean set of clothes, spell-sanitization always made his clothes feel stiff and uncomfortable, and put his long hair back up.

"Terribly sorry about that, Mr. Evans, standard procedure you know," said one of the wizards who'd been doing the wand work, and older man with a fluffy cap of white hair and an equally fluffy white beard.

"No problem," said Harry with an easy grin.

It was a grin that would make anyone with half a brain cell and who was using it aware that they were being tricked in one way or another, but either the fluffy-haired guy wasn't as intelligent as his very professorial brown tweed robes portrayed him to be or he wasn't paying attention. Either way Harry won.

For all their careful monitoring the great thing about the Department of International Magical Travel was that they didn't check that you were who you said you were. Harry could have said his name was Alemi Tarabotti and he doubted anyone would have batted an eyelash.

The fluffy-haired wizard went through the standard round of questions and then handed Harry off to the healer-trainee on site who waved her diagnostic wand over him lazily while he stood with his arms out at the sides. She did heal the jagged cut on his hand though, which was something. Then he was required to acknowledge any animal, vegetable or sentience he had on his person or in his luggage and was subjected to hearing about the long list of items that that the Ministry had officially banned and that he could be fined upwards of 100 galleons for owning.

After all that ridiculousness he was finally brought to another, more conventional, waiting room where he had to go through another round of entirely pointless questioning conducted by an exhausted looking wizard before he could sign his fake name on the arrivals list and leave the building without being stunned by the guards on duty.

Finally out in the relatively fresh air of the busy London street outside the Ministry building, Harry breathed deep and stretched. He dug around in his satchel until he found his phone and a pack of cigarettes and dialled the Burrow, holding the cell phone between his shoulder and his chin while he dug with his free hand for his lighter.

"Hello Harry dear," answered Mrs. Weasley after the third ring.

After a summer of calling Ron at least once a day, most of the Weasleys were old hands at using the telephone.

"Hey Mrs. Weasley," Harry answered, grinning to himself as his fingers closed around the cheap red plastic of his lighter.

"Did your portkey get in on time? I know that the department is a madhouse with all the wizards arriving for the World Cup, Charlie was waiting in the building for hours to sign out and Bill was held up by customs, something about a piece of the treasure he was bringing into Gringotts."

"It wasn't too bad actually, looks like their devoting a lot of resources keeping a lid on whatever happens to be coming out of the east so they rushed me through."

"But they didn't give you any trouble?"

"Nah, it was pretty standard."

"That's wonderful dear, so we'll see you tonight for dinner?"

"I wouldn't miss it," said Harry with a wider grin, "I'll be there in about an hour."

"We'll see you then, Harry dear, travel safely."

"Of course Mrs. Weasley, see you in a bit."

Harry hung up the phone with a click and tossed it back into his satchel, lighting his cigarette and taking a drag. He sighed in contentment as the familiar acrid taste of hot smoke filled his mouth and hit the back of his throat, feeling the stress of the past two hours just melt away. He took a walk around the block to fully appreciate what was probably going to be his last cigarette for a little while and then hailed the Knight Bus.

The double decker wizarding bus was just as loud and purple as it had been at the beginning of summer and Harry mounted the steps digging a few sickles out of his satchel and handing the conductor, a young witch Harry didn't recognize sporting a bored expression and a bright red gem in her nose ring, the appropriate fare. The bus sped off with a sharp crack as Harry staggered unsteadily into a seat at one of the tables. Wizards, he reflected, had done some brilliant things with magic but transportation was not their strong point. Harry couldn't wait until he knew how to either apparate or drive.

The bus dropped him off just outside the village of Ottery St. Catchpole in front of the lane leading up to the Burrow itself. Harry hefted his satchel higher onto his shoulder and set off at a brisk clip eager to get up to the house but not quite desperate enough to actually embarrass himself running up the lane.

The familiar sight of the lopsided patchwork house at the end of the long winding drive brought a smile to Harry's face. The Weasleys were Harry's all-time favourite family and the sight of the overgrown yard and the multi-coloured wellington boots were a welcome sight after spending months living in a tent. That wasn't to say he hadn't come to think of his tent as his home away from Hogwarts but no one he truly cared for was waiting for him inside.

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**AN: **Hey guys, thanks for reading! Before you ask I'm not going to tell you what the pairing is. It'll be pretty obvious within the first four chapters or so and if you're that desperate to know you can always creep the "It's Complicated" thread on HPFC.

Before you go I'd love a review! So type something into the little box at the bottom of the screen and hit submit! I live to hear from you guys, the good, the bad, and the helpful so it'll really make my day!


	2. Chapter 2

**WARNING: It's Complicated**

**Chapter Two: Bill is the Coolest Guy Ever and Puberty Has Been Good to Neville**

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Harry Potter. Anything you recognize come directly from the Goblet fo Fire which means of course that it is really not mine.

**Author's Note:** Firstly, thank you as always to everyone who took the time to review, alert and/or favorite! Here's to you guys! Nextly, story time kiddies, gather round!

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The sun was just starting to think about setting, hanging low in the west and casting everything in a warm golden glow. Harry spotted Crookshanks chasing a garden gnome through the tall grass and his smile widened into a full-blown grin. If Crookshanks was here then Hermione was as well, and sure enough as he turned the corner there she was, laughing at something Ginny had said.

"Harry?" said Ginny who was facing him, brown eyes going wide.

"Harry!" cried Hermione whipping around a smile lighting up her face, Harry found himself caught up in the hug to end all hugs, "Look at you! You look amazing, I love your hair! But really how many earrings do you need? How was Albania? Did you learn a lot? You have to tell me all about it later."

She released him held him out at arms-length and then hugged him again for good measure.

"Nice to see you too, Mione," Harry laughed, wrapping his arms around her back and squeezing more gently, "And Albania was definitely exciting."

"H-hey Harry," said Ginny with a blush and a small wave.

Ginny had had a bit of a crush on him since she was a little girl but at least it wasn't as bad as it had been. Before she hadn't been able to look him in the face or even be in the same room with him without blushing up to the roots of her flame-red hair.

"Hey Ginny, are you having a good summer?"

"Yeah not bad, nothing as exciting as going to Albania of course—"

"What are you talking about Ginny, tell him about Neville!" Hermione admonished.

Ginny blushed and grimaced pretty much simultaneously.

"That's not really exciting so much as it's embarrassing Hermione," Ginny said, Hermione made a face as if she would protest but Ginny waved her off, "I'll tell, I'll tell him, Merlin!"

"Tell me what?" asked Harry confused.

Ginny sighed.

"Neville and I have been contractually betrothed since I was born, something to do with an alliance between the Weasleys and the Longbottoms. It's about a hundred years old but until me all the Weasley and Longbottom children have been boys and the contract has clauses about natural born children of the line," Ginny waved a hand, dismissing the details, "Anyway, Dowager Longbottom, that's Neville's gran, is getting anxious about the marriage so she sent Neville to stay with us for the summer so we can, quote on quote, get to know each other."

Harry blinked, shocked. Ginny Weasley and Neville Longbottom, engaged to be married, who would have thought it? Not him certainly, and an arranged marriage too. Not that Harry was really surprised to hear that, the wizarding community could be shockingly medieval when it wanted to be.

"Wow," he said shaking his head to clear it, "Just wow, well, I guess congratulations?"

Ginny sighed again.

"Thanks, I guess."

"You don't sound too thrilled," Harry observed.

"Neville is a nice guy, and I mean both of us have known about this forever, known each other forever, but I just don't feel that way about him and I know he feels the same. This whole thing has just been super awkward," said Ginny twirling a strand of hair around her finger and staring at the faded pink of her trainers, "Mum and Dad have been really supportive trying to find loopholes and stuff, but…well it's looking pretty set in stone."

"To top it off poor Neville is being terrorized by Ron and the Twins," Hermione added shaking her head, "Those three. It isn't Neville's fault he's betrothed to Ginny and they're barely even good friends, which is I suppose why Neville's grandmother is so concerned and arranged this whole thing, but still."

"Well if you two don't want to get married isn't there some sort of loophole? Give the contract to Mione, bet she finds it in thirty seconds," said Harry flashing Hermione a grin.

"We've already been over it with a fine toothed comb, the only ways to invalidate the contract are death, infertility, disowning, or if one or both of the parties finds a bond mate."

"What's a bond mate?" asked Harry, "That doesn't sound too bad."

"Magical bonding, it is a fascinating subject," said Hermione in a voice that let Harry know she'd owl ordered a number of tomes on the topic, "A number of magical creatures create magical bonds with their mates, veela, werewolves, and vampires most notably, but lifebonds can form naturally between particularly compatible lovers, even in muggle pairings, and there are some spells that can be used to help induce lifebonds, some marriage contracts even require them."

"So, there you have it, try and induce one," shrugged Harry, "What have you got to lose?"

"Are you about to volunteer?" asked Hermione archly, crossing her arms over her chest.

"Right, right, sorry, I won't bring it up again," Harry said, raising his hands in the universal gesture of surrender, "Where's Ron and the rest of the lot?" Harry asked, trying to change the subject before he really put his foot in it.

"They'll all be in the kitchen," said Ginny moving towards the back door, "We're just waiting for mum to give us our marching orders for dinner."

She looked visibly disappointed that he didn't immediately volunteer himself up to be her life mate but really what was Harry supposed to do? He was gay after all.

"Hey Ron, look who we found!"

Harry followed Hermione through the back door and into the Weasleys' large homey kitchen. If the Burrow had a central hub, this room would be it. Looking around, Harry saw that Ron and George were sitting at the scrubbed wooden table with two red-haired people Harry had never seen before, though he knew immediately who they must be: Bill and Charlie, the two eldest Weasley brothers.

"Harry!" Ron was out of his chair and on his feet in seconds a grin splitting his freckled face as he pulled Harry into a very manly one-armed hug.

Harry looked up into Ron's bright brown eyes and scowled. The youngest Weasley boy had grown again and was now topping out at a good six feet.

"I hate you, you unnatural beanpole," Harry grumbled squeezing the redhead's arm so he knew he didn't mean it.

"S'not my fault you're so short that come September first McGonagall's gonna be shuffling you off to be sorted with the first years," Ron protested with a wicked grin that wouldn't have been out of place on either or both of the twins.

"I hate you," Harry repeated before turning to the room at large, "Now introduce me to your brothers."

"How're you doing, Harry?" said the nearer of the two, grinning at him and holding out a large hand, which Harry shook, feeling calluses and blisters under his fingers.

This had to be Charlie, who worked with dragons in Romania. Charlie was built like the twins, shorter and stockier than Percy and Ron, who were both long and lanky. He had a broad, good-natured face, which was weather-beaten, down-to-earth handsome and so freckly that he looked almost tanned despite his milk fair Weasley complexion. His arms were lovely and muscular, and one of them had a large, shiny burn on it. Harry could guess that Mrs. Weasley had had a thing or two to say when she'd seen that.

"You'll be Charlie then, right?"

"Got it in one," laughed the redhead.

"Thanks for the thing with Norbert, I know Ron said it but," Harry shrugged.

"I'd say anytime but dragon-smuggling is highly illegal, very difficult and moderately dangerous, and I already give Mum kittens every time she sees me with a new burn."

Harry laughed a bit at that.

"And that makes you Bill," Harry said turning to the other unfamiliar redhead.

Bill got to his feet, smiling, and also shook Harry's hand. They both got a good look at each other and wry grins twisted their mouths.

Suffice it to say Bill wasn't at all what Harry was expecting. He'd heard stories about all the Weasley brothers from Ron of course but all he really knew about Bill was that he'd been Head Boy and after he'd graduated he'd taken a job at Gringotts as a cursebreaker and currently worked in Egypt. Harry had been expecting an older version of Percy, someone fussy, anal-retentive and completely against rule-breaking. Instead he was confronted, at least outwardly, by a person with whom he shared similar taste.

"Love the hair," said Bill, referring to the sloppy ponytail of black streaked copper and swooping bangs that hid his most famous scar.

"Love the earring, and should I mention the boots or is that too much?"

Bill sported a small fang dangling from his left ear, a tame contrast to Harry's two silver hoops and one bar in the one ear and one silver hoop and two glittering green stones in the other. Bill was also sporting clothes that wouldn't have been out of place at a muggle rock concert and black dragonhide boots that very closely resembled a pair that Harry had tucked away in his satchel.

"Well, at least I know Ron's friends have good taste," grinned Bill.

Any further self-congratulation on their part was interrupted by the twins, who, not to be outdone, grabbed Bill by the shoulders and shoved him behind them.

"Hey there Harry!" They chorused grinning from ear to ear as they each took a hand and began pumping it up and down in overly vigorous unison.

"I'm George,"

"And this handsome devil is Fred!"

"Hey Fred. George," He greeted with an eye roll.

The twins pouted but returned to Harry the use of his arms.

"Not fair," complained George.

"Yeah, how do you always know?" demanded Fred.

"Trade secret," said Harry with a wink.

Truthfully it was because early in third year when Harry had, had a crush on the twins and had spent hours staring at them out of the corners of his eyes he'd come to notice that Fred was always first. Despite being younger he was the loudest, the most arrogant, and the most dramatic of the pair. George tended to be the calmer more collected one. That and he had a peculiar upside-down heart shaped freckle in the corner of his left eye.

There was a sudden warning shout and a crash, then the unmistakable sound of something falling down a short section of stairs.

"Looks like Neville found the surprise we left for him," said Fred with a grin that promised humiliation.

Sure enough, seconds later, Mr. Weasley came in supporting a very green Neville who was sporting webbed hands, flippers for feet and a sort of resigned expression.

"Fred! George! What have you done this time!" demanded Mr. Weasley looking furious.

The twins, rather than being cowed, snickered quietly, a far cry from the outright laughter lurking behind their eyes, they were obviously restraining themselves.

Mr. Weasley was tall and freckled, wearing patchy green robes, and had one of Neville's arms slung over his shoulder as he helped the perpetually clumsy Gryffindor, who was having an even more difficult time of it now that his feet were a good two and a half feet long, into a seat at the kitchen table.

"Relax Dad, it's the same stuff we use to make the Froggy Fudge," said Fred.

"Yeah Dad, it goes right away with a quick finite," added George.

Obligingly Charlie whipped out his wand and hit Neville with the counter spell and within seconds the green coloration and webbing had faded back into normal flesh color and human fingers and toes.

"Thanks Charlie," muttered Neville flushing with embarrassment.

"Spoil our fun," Grumbled the twins in chorus.

That set Mr. Weasley off.

"Fun? FUN! I don't care if it is harmless! That's not the point! It's insulting and embarrassing and I can't believe that my own sons would be so irresponsible and deliberately bullying! Not only is Neville a guest in our house but he is going to be married to your sister!" raged Mr. Weasley. "You wait until I tell your mother –"

"Tell me what?" said a voice behind them.

Mrs. Weasley had just entered the kitchen, probably drawn by all the commotion. She was a short, plump woman with a very kind face, though her eyes were presently narrowed with suspicion.

"Oh hello, Harry, dear," she said, spotting him and smiling, she blinked when she got a good look at him and said, "What have you done to your hair—never mind," she said shaking her head, "Later." Then her eyes snapped back to her husband. "Tell me what, Arthur?"

Mr. Weasley hesitated. Harry could tell that, however angry he was with Fred and George, he hadn't really intended to tell Mrs. Weasley what had happened. There was a silence, while Mr. Weasley eyed his wife nervously.

"Tell me what, Arthur?" Mrs. Weasley repeated, in a dangerous sort of voice.

"It's nothing, Molly," mumbled Mr. Weasley, "Fred and George just – but I've had words with them –"

"What have they done this time?" said Mrs. Weasley. "If it's got anything to do with Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes –"

"Why don't you show Harry where he's sleeping, Ron?" said Hermione from the doorway.

"He knows where he's sleeping," said Ron, "In my room, he slept there last –"

"We can all go," said Hermione pointedly.

"Oh," said Ron, cottoning on. "Right."

"Yeah, we'll come too," said George.

"You stay where you are!" snarled Mrs. Weasley.

Harry and Ron edged out of the kitchen, dragging Neville out on their way, and they, Hermione, and Ginny set off along the narrow hallway and up the rickety staircase that zigzagged through the house to the upper stories.

"Hey, Neville," Harry greeted once they were clear of the kitchen, "How's your summer been so far?"

To his credit Neville mustered up a smile and said, "Not bad, you?" rather than letting on just how miserable he probably was.

Harry would bet all the gold in Gringotts that he'd had more fun in Albania in the fifteen minutes he spent being chased by zombies than Neville had had this whole summer. The Weasley boys were all nothing if not prone to overreaction and notoriously overprotective.

"Pretty great once I got out from Privet Dr. actually," Harry said.

"Ron mentioned you were in Albania?"

The look Neville shot him practically begged Harry to change the subject.

"Yeah, I've been working on a way to get muggle technology to work in areas of high magical concentration but I hit a snag with my theory pretty early in the game so I went to talk with Professor Eckenwalder who runs a lab just outside of Tirana."

Excuses, excuses. He'd already been camping in his magic tent when he'd decided to head out to Albania.

It'd taken Harry two weeks of summer vacation to realize that he was an idiot. He had money. There was no reason that he had to stay with the Dursleys over the summer.

Of course he was well aware that the adults in his life would argue differently. Say he needed adult supervision, but really, he'd been looking after himself since he was three years old. If he'd needed adult supervision that desperately he'd probably be dead by now.

Still, he'd realized it was probably better if he stayed in the muggle world to keep the concerned adults in the wizarding world from dragging him back to Privet Dr. He'd waited until the Dursleys went out to buy a new set of patio furniture and left while they were occupied.

The underground hadn't been difficult to navigate, even with a huge trunk and an empty bird-cage. He still remembered the route from when Hagrid had taken him on the train to buy his school supplies, though he'd almost been short on fare, and soon he found himself back in Diagon Alley. He'd booked a room for the night at the Leaky with Tom the Barkeep and left his trunk and Hedwig's cage there and then took himself and his vault key down the street to Gringotts.

The goblins were just as unfriendly as always but they allowed him to exchange a large amount of his galleons into pounds without a fuss and informed him, rather shrewdly, that if he was no longer under the guardianship of his muggle relatives he would have to fill out a number of forms in triplicate and successfully pass a blood test before he would be allowed access to his inheritance. His true inheritance, mind, not just his trust, and gave him the name and address of the Potters' solicitor who they said would be able to provide him with the forms. All for what they said was a very reasonable fee and made Harry suspect he'd been conned. Bloody goblins.

Then, in possession of a small fortune and well on his way to gaining possession of an even larger one, Harry had done what any sensible person would have. He went shopping.

Wizards had all sorts of neat gadgets and tricky items and it wasn't long before he found a good sized magical tent and an enchanted satchel that could carry the entire contents of the Dursley house and still feel no heavier than your average book bag. He'd also learned about the Knight Bus and how to summon it.

He hadn't been able to understand why something like a bus could be so blatantly magical and yet modern muggle technology went wonky around magic and so he'd bought several books on the subject by owl order.

Which was how he'd found himself in a campground a week later up to his elbows in computer guts, manuals, research papers, potions texts, ward stones, rune theory, science books and do-it-yourself guides.

He'd managed to figure out that magic was an electromagnetic wave, like light or x-rays, and that the computers were sensitive to it and then, well, then he had been completely lost and had used that as an excuse to flee to Albania.

There he'd managed to get a meeting with Professor Eckenwalder by throwing his fame around a little and the woman had actually kissed him when he plopped an advanced physics textbook in front of her and explained what he thought was going on.

"I can't tell you how jealous I am Harry," Hermione butted in, "I mean to think you actually got to work with one of the top experts in the field of Magitek and Technomancy!"

"Yeah well it wasn't all sunshine and roses, believe me, but I met some pretty cool people and saw some amazing stuff. Of course, Eckenwalder nearly worked me into an early grave but I think we've finally got a working prototype for protective plating that will keep things like wards and ley lines from mucking with computers, music players and phones. I'm supposed to be testing it while we're at Hogwarts because if it works well there than it will work pretty much anywhere else."

"How'd you even manage to y'know, outthink someone like Hermione?" asked Ron.

Hermione looked mortally offended by that implication and Harry laughed.

"How do you think? Sheer dumb luck and the benefit of not knowing what I should know about the background of the subject."

"It's completely unfair, and I want to see all your notes Harry!" said Hermione with a dictatorial poke to his bicep.

"Yeah, yeah. I'd figured. What are Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes?" Harry asked as they climbed, ready to change the subject himself.

Hermione had enough intellectual ego to rival…well…everyone. Most of the time she deserved it but it did get a little annoying.

Ron and Ginny both laughed, although Hermione and Neville didn't. In fact Neville looked downright resentful.

"Mum found this stack of order forms when she was cleaning Fred and George's room," said Ron, "Great long price lists for stuff they've invented. Joke stuff, you know. Fake wands and trick sweets, loads of stuff. It was brilliant. I never knew they'd been inventing all that."

"We've been hearing explosions out of their room for ages, but we never thought they were actually making things," said Ginny. "We thought they just liked the noise."

"And what?" asked Harry rhetorically, "Just didn't want to do something as mundane as blaring their music?"

"Well yeah," shrugged Ron, "Their inventions were brilliant, are brilliant, only, most of the stuff – well, all of it, really – was a bit dangerous. And, you know, they were planning to sell it at Hogwarts to make some money, and Mum went mad at them. Told them they weren't allowed to make any more of it, and burned all the order forms. She's furious at them anyway. They didn't get as many O.W.L.s as she expected."

"And then there was this big row," Ginny said, "because Mum wants them to go into the Ministry of Magic like Dad, and they told her all they want to do is open a joke shop."

Just then a door on the second landing opened, and a face poked out wearing horn-rimmed glasses and a very annoyed expression.

"Hey Percy," said Harry.

"Oh hello, Harry," said Percy, pushing his glasses a little further up his nose, "I was wondering who was making all the noise. I'm trying to work in here, you know I've got a report to finish for the office – and it's rather difficult to concentrate when people keep thundering up and down the stairs."

"We're not thundering," said Ron irritably, "We're walking. Sorry if we've disturbed the top-secret workings of the Ministry of Magic."

"What are you working on?" asked Harry, more to keep Ron from starting a row in the narrow hallway where they couldn't escape then out of any real desire to know.

"A report for the Department of International Magical Cooperation," said Percy smugly. "We're trying to standardize cauldron thickness. Some of these foreign imports are just a shade too thin – leakages have been increasing at a rate of almost three percent a year –"

"That'll change the world, that report will," said Ron flatly. "Front page of the Daily Prophet, I expect, cauldron leaks."

Percy went slightly pink.

"You might sneer, Ron," he said heatedly, "but unless some sort of international law is imposed we might well find the market flooded with flimsy, shallow-bottomed products that seriously endanger –"

"Yeah, yeah, all right," said Ron with a dismissive wave, and he started off upstairs again.

Percy slammed his bedroom door shut.

Harry and Hermione both reached up at the same time to smack Ron round the back of the head.

"Oi, what gives!" he protested.

"Honestly Ronald—" puffed Hermione gearing up for a lecture.

"Don't be such a prat. Percy's your brother, support him. If he wants to find leaking cauldrons interesting, more the power to him because someone has to and it sure as hell isn't going to be me," said Harry succinctly.

Hermione blew out a long exasperated breath.

"How long have you been waiting for the perfect opportunity to give him that lecture Mione?"

"Long enough, Harry James Potter. If you're not careful you'll get a lecture about taking the wind out of my sails," she warned.

As the group followed Ron up three more flights of stairs, shouts from the kitchen below echoed up to them. It sounded as though Mr. Weasley had told Mrs. Weasley about the twins turning Neville into a half-frog.

Neville winced at the sudden increase in noise.

Harry felt for the guy, trapped between six older brothers and a betrothal contract he wasn't too keen on fulfilling. Life for Neville Longbottom pretty much sucked right now. Still it looked like the universe was working on making it up to him, Harry thought glancing at his dorm mate out of the corner of his eye.

Neville had hit a growth spurt that put him a half-head shorter than Ron and used up all his pre-pubescent pudge, and had he really always been that cute? Round-faced with softly curling brown hair, a smattering of freckles across the bridge his nose and a near-permanent sheepish tilt to his wide expressive mouth, he was practically the poster boy for cute.

It was a damn shame he was betrothed.

After climbing an exhausting number of stairs finally the group reached the room at the top of the house where Ron slept. It looked much as it had the last time that Harry had come to stay. The same posters of Ron's favorite Quidditch team, the Chudley Cannons, were whirling and waving on the walls and sloping ceiling, and the fish tank on the windowsill, which had previously held frog spawn, now contained one extremely large frog. Ron's old rat, Scabbers, was here no more, seeing as how it turned out he wasn't actually a rodent so much as a traitorous deatheater coward, but instead there was the tiny gray owl that had delivered Harry his Hogsmeade permission form to the Hogwarts Express at the end of last term. It had been a gift of sorts from Harry's godfather, Sirius Black, and was hopping up and down in a small cage and twittering madly.

"Shut up, Pig," said Ron, edging his way between the two old mattresses that had been squeezed into the room. "Fred and George are in here with us, because Bill and Charlie are in their room," he told Harry. "Percy gets to keep his room all to himself because he's got to work. Anyway the long and the short of it is you and Neville are sharing the one mattress and Fred and George get the other."

"Sorry Neville, hope you don't mind," said Harry.

"It's fine," said Neville, "It's only for a night or two anyway."

"I would share, but I don't even fit in my bed, so there really not enough room for any of you lot," Ron said with a defensive shrug.

Harry believed it too, Ron's bed was a narrow twin that while slightly longer than average was still small enough that Ron's ankles probably hung off the end.

"No worries mate, now, massively important question – why are you calling that owl Pig?" Harry asked Ron.

"Because he's an idiot," said Ginny, "Its proper name is Pigwidgeon."

"Yeah, and that's not a stupid name at all," said Ron sarcastically. "Ginny named him," he explained to Harry. "She reckons it's sweet. And I tried to change it, Merlin knows I did try, but it was too late, he won't answer to anything else. So now he's Pig. I've got to keep him up here because he annoys Errol and Hermes. He annoys me too, come to that."

Pigwidgeon zoomed happily around his cage, hooting shrilly. Harry knew Ron too well to take him seriously when he griped about the little scrap of feather fluff though. He had moaned continually about, Scabbers, but had been beside himself when Hermione's cat, Crookshanks, looked to have eaten him. Of course that was before they'd all discovered he was an Animagus and responsible for the death of Harry's parents, his godfather's imprisonment in Azkaban and the death of twelve muggle passersby. Now Ron would probably throw a party if it was announced that Crookshanks had eaten him.

"So," said Harry, sitting down on one of the beds and watching the Chudley Cannons zooming in and out of the posters on the ceiling, "Percy looks like he's enjoying work, then?"

"Enjoying it?" said Ron darkly. "I don't reckon he'd come home if Dad didn't make him. He's obsessed. Just don't get him onto the subject of his boss." Ron affected a very snooty falsetto, "According to Mr. Crouch ... as I was saying to Mr. Crouch ... Mr. Crouch is of the opinion ...Mr. Crouch was telling me ... They'll be announcing their engagement any day now. I can't take one more word of it. I'm this close to murdering him. And you know, speaking of engagements, he hasn't said a word about this engagement bollocks! No offense mate."

"None taken," sighed Neville.

"You could take a leaf out of Percy's book and keep your nose out of it Ron," snapped Ginny, eyes flashing dangerously, "You're just making everything so…so…"

"Unnecessarily difficult?" suggested Hermione mildly.

"Not what I was going to say, really, but we'll go with that!"

"And you're not doing anything at all!" said Ron, incensed, "You're just sitting there nodding along like you're actually going to marry him! As if he could ever be good enough for you! No offense!"

"If I was going to take offense I would have done it already," said Neville rolling his eyes and seating himself next to Harry.

Ron ignored him, far too busy going off about ancient bloody contracts, stubborn brat sisters and stupid ponces who couldn't have had at least one daughter.

"Ron's taking this even worse than Ginny," Harry commented watching the back and forth between the two siblings who were growing louder and redder by the second, "Are they making him dress in pink or serving only cucumber sandwiches at the wedding or something?"

"Sister complex," said Hermione knowingly.

"No more about the wedding," groaned Neville scrubbing a hand over his face, "I can't take it anymore, I really can't. It's been like this all summer. If it isn't those two going at it, it's the twins and their pranks, and of course it's my fault even though I don't even want to marry the girl!"

This last bit was snapped into the sudden silence of a lull in Ron and Ginny's argument. Neville flushed up to his ears.

"That is – what I mean to say—"

"I think they've stopped arguing, downstairs I mean," said Hermione, to cover the awkward moment, because it looked like Ron was about to start in on Neville. "Shall we go down and help your mum with dinner?"

"Yeah, all right," said Ron, cowed into merely leveling Neville with a glare by the matching looks from Hermione and his sister.

Once Hermione and Ginny had managed to steer Ron out of the room, Neville groaned outright and dropped his head into his hands.

"Cheer up Nev, it could be worse," said Harry brightly, wrapping one thin arm around his shoulders and give him a quick, perfectly innocent, squeeze.

"How?" asked Neville tiredly, his voice oddly muffled.

"Not sure, but it can always be worse. Always."

Neville groaned again, but from the shake of his shoulders he chuckled a bit too.

"Thanks Harry, you're a real comfort."

"Oi! Are you two coming or not?" demanded Ron.

"Keep your bloody shirt on!" Harry shouted back.

The two of them, got up, met a harried looking Ron and the two girls on the fourth floor landing and went back downstairs to find Mrs. Weasley alone in the kitchen, looking extremely bad tempered.

"We're eating out in the garden," she said when they came in. "There's just not room for twelve people in here. Could you take the plates outside, girls? Bill and Charlie are setting up the tables. Knives and forks, please, you two," she said to Ron and Harry, pointing her wand a little more vigorously than she had intended at a pile of potatoes in the sink, which shot out of their skins so fast that they ricocheted off the walls and ceiling.

"Neville dear, there's bread on the – Oh for heaven's sake," she snapped, now directing her wand at a dustpan, which hopped off the sideboard and started skating across the floor, scooping up the potatoes.

Neville was quick to grab the bread basket and the butter dish and flee outside. Harry didn't really blame him. There was bravery, and then there was what Harry and Ron were doing remaining in the kitchen where the incensed Mrs. Weasley had access to large knives, fire, and a wicked looking meat tenderizer, which was kissing-cousins with sheer bloody stupidity.

"Those two!" she burst out savagely, now pulling pots and pans out of a cupboard with unnecessarily violent crashing and banging. "I don't know what's going to happen to them, I really don't. No ambition, unless you count making as much trouble as they possibly can!"

Mrs. Weasley slammed a large copper saucepan down on the kitchen table and began to wave her wand around inside it. A creamy sauce poured from the wand tip as she stirred.

"It's not as though they haven't got brains," she continued irritably, taking the saucepan over to the stove and lighting it with a further poke of her wand, "But they're wasting them, and unless they pull themselves together soon, they'll be in real trouble. I've had more owls from Hogwarts about them than the rest put together. If they carry on the way they're going, they'll end up in front of the Improper Use of Magic Office."

Mrs. Weasley jabbed her wand at the cutlery drawer, which shot open. Harry and Ron both jumped out of the way as several knives soared out of it, flew across the kitchen, and began chopping the potatoes, which had just been tipped back into the sink by the dustpan.

"I don't know where we went wrong with them," said Mrs. Weasley, putting down her wand and starting to pull out still more saucepans. "It's been the same for years, one thing after another, and they won't listen to – OH NOT AGAIN!"

She had picked up her wand from the table, and it had emitted a loud squeak and turned into a giant rubber mouse.

"One of their fake wands again!" she shouted. "How many times have I told them not to leave them lying around?"

The sauce on the stove was smoking and Harry rushed over, grabbing a wooden spoon as he went, and quickly took it off the fire, stirring to make sure the bottom wasn't burning before turning the dial down on the stove.

"Oh for Merlin's sake!" cried Mrs. Weasley, it looked all of a sudden less like she was in a homicidal fury and more like she was on the verge of breaking down and crying, but she took a deep breath and the moment passed. "Thank you, Harry dear, but I have things under control."

"You sure, Mrs. Weasley? I can help out here if you think you need it," he said concernedly setting the saucepan back down on the heat and continuing to stir, watching it out of the corner of his eye.

"Nonsense, I have everything in hand now. Go and help set the table. Scat."

"C'mon," Ron said hurriedly to Harry, seizing a handful of cutlery from the open drawer, sense of self-preservation returning, "Let's go and help Bill and Charlie."

They left Mrs. Weasley to her cooking and cursing and headed out the back door into the yard.

They had only gone a few paces when Crookshanks, came pelting out of the garden, bottle-brush tail held high in the air, chasing a gnome clear across the yard. Barely ten inches high, its horny little feet pattered very fast as it sprinted across the yard and dived headlong into one of the Wellington boots that lay scattered around the door. Harry could hear the gnome giggling madly as Crookshanks inserted a paw into the boot, trying to reach it.

Crookshanks looked up at Harry and Ron and meowed demandingly.

"Don't look at me," snorted Ron, "You trapped it in there it's your job to get it out. Besides what makes you think I could catch it?"

Crookshanks meowed again but turned back to the boot and the gnome with renewed vigor.

"You and Crookshanks are getting on then finally," said Harry amused.

Ron's ears turned pink.

"C'mon, let's go before they send out a search party."

There was a very loud crashing noise coming from the other side of the house. The source of the commotion was revealed as they entered the garden and saw that Bill and Charlie both had their wands out and were making two battered old tables fly high above the lawn, smashing into each other, each attempting to knock the other's out of the air. Fred and George were cheering, Ginny was laughing, and Hermione was hovering near the hedge, apparently torn between amusement and anxiety.

Neville had snagged a heel of bread and was munching on it covertly while everyone was distracted by the spectacle.

Bill's table caught Charlie's with a huge bang and knocked one of its legs off.

There was a sudden clatter from overhead, and they all looked up to see Percy's head poking out of a window on the second floor.

"Will you keep it down?!" he bellowed.

"Sorry, Perce," said Bill, grinning unrepentantly. "How're the cauldron bottoms coming on?"

"Very badly," said Percy peevishly, and he slammed the window shut hard enough to rattle the glass.

Chuckling, Bill and Charlie directed the tables safely onto the grass, end to end, and then, with a double flick of his wand, Bill reattached the table leg and conjured tablecloths from nowhere.

By seven o'clock, the two tables were groaning under dishes and dishes of Mrs. Weasley's excellent cooking, and the nine Weasleys, Harry, Neville and Hermione were settling themselves down to eat beneath a clear, deep-blue sky.

Harry listened rather than talked as he helped himself to chicken and ham pie, boiled potatoes, and salad.

A dinner at the Weasleys was a study in multi-tasking, there was eating, banter, arguments, cross-talk. Harry let it all wash over him enjoying the sense of warm chaos, and passing Neville, who was clearly still too overwhelmed to jump right in some choice bits before they were all taken. Weasleys were very serious about their food and their eating and, with Mrs. Weasley being the sole exception, the rule of thumb was you snooze you lose.

At the far end of the table, Percy was telling his father all about his report on cauldron bottoms.

"I've told Mr. Crouch that I'll have it ready by Tuesday," Percy was saying self-importantly. "That's a bit sooner than he expected it, but I like to keep on top of things. I think he'll be grateful I've done it in good time, I mean, it's extremely busy in our department just now, what with all the arrangements for the World Cup. We're just not getting the support we need from the Department of Magical Games and Sports. Ludo Bagman –"

"I like Ludo," said Mr. Weasley mildly as he smeared a bit of butter on his boiled potato. "He was the one who got us such good tickets for the Cup. I did him a bit of a favor: His brother, Otto, got into a spot of trouble – a lawnmower with unnatural powers – I smoothed the whole thing over."

"Oh Bagman's likable enough, of course," said Percy dismissively, and Harry was starting to see a theme with the hand waving, "but how he ever got to be Head of Department ... when I compare him to Mr. Crouch! I can't see Mr. Crouch losing a member of our department and not trying to find out what's happened to them. You realize Bertha Jorkins has been missing for over a month now? Went on holiday to Albania and never came back?"

Gone to vacation in Albania and she never came back? Well that was a no brainer, thought Harry snorting a bit into his pumpkin juice. She was probably eaten by zombies.

Come to think of it though, hadn't he heard something about that? That name, Bertha Jorkins, it sounded so familiar...

"Yes, I was asking Ludo about that," said Mr. Weasley, frowning. "He says Bertha's gotten lost plenty of times before now – though must say, if it was someone in my department, I'd be worried. . ."

"Oh Bertha's hopeless, all right," said Percy. "I hear she's been shunted from department to department for years, much more trouble than she's worth ... but all the same, Bagman ought to be trying to find her. Mr. Crouch has been taking a personal interest, she worked in our department at one time, you know, and I think Mr. Crouch was quite fond of her – but Bagman just keeps laughing and saying sheprobably misread the map and ended up in Australia instead of Albania. However," Percy heaved an impressive sigh and took a deep swig of elderflower wine, "We've got quite enough on our plates at the Department of International Magical Cooperation without trying to find members of other departments too. As you know, we've got another big event to organize right after the World Cup."

Percy cleared his throat significantly and looked down toward the end of the table where Harry, Ron, Neville, Ginny and Hermione were sitting.

"You know the one I'm talking about, Father." He raised his voice slightly. "The top-secret one."

Ron rolled his eyes and muttered to Harry and Hermione, "He's been trying to get us to ask what that event is ever since he started work. Probably an exhibition of thick-bottomed cauldrons."

"Not even Snape would make us sit through that," Harry denied immediately.

"Yeah," said Neville wryly, "He's terrifying but never boring."

"Oh Neville—" sighed Hermione, starting in on a familiar lecture.

Neville sat through it stoically nodding in all the right places as his eyes glazed over and he stole a bit of chicken off Harry's plate. Harry watched for a minute amused, before tuning Hermione out.

In the middle of the table, Mrs. Weasley was arguing with Bill about his earring, which seemed to be a recent acquisition.

"…with a horrible great fang on it. Really, Bill, what do they say at the bank?"

"Mum, no one at the bank gives a damn how I dress as long as I bring home plenty of treasure," said Bill patiently.

"And your hair's getting silly, dear," said Mrs. Weasley, fingering her wand lovingly." I wish you'd let me give it a trim."

"I like it," said Ginny, who was sitting beside Bill. "You're so old-fashioned, Mum. Anyway, it's nowhere near as long as Professor Dumbledore's. Besides Mum, Harry's hair is about that long now."

Evil. Evil woman. No doubt that was revenge for not offering himself up for the Parson's noose earlier. Ah, well, hell hath no fury so it probably could be worse.

"Yes, Harry dear, what in the name of Merlin possessed you?"

"The woman that did it offered to do it for free," shrugged Harry.

It was true enough anyway. He'd been shagging Dmitri for about a week when Lady Sonja had shown up out of the blue and done his hair and the one earring herself, this after a grilling that still left Harry reeling every time he thought about it. Then, when it had been determined that, no, he was not taking advantage of the easily led half-vampire, they'd gone shopping together and Harry had liked the effect so much he added more.

"Besides Mrs. Weasley," he added flashing her his most charming smile, "It's so much easier to manage this way."

Also true since no one could deny his hair had never lain so flat when it was short.

"Well I suppose..."

Mrs. Weasley got drawn into an argument with Ginny about the proper way to hold a knife and so Harry used the opportunity to find another conversation. Next to Mrs. Weasley, Fred, George, and Charlie were all talking spiritedly about the World Cup. Perfect.

"It's got to be Ireland," said Charlie thickly, through a mouthful of potato. "They absolutely flattened Peru in the semifinals."

"Bulgaria has got Viktor Krum, though," said Fred.

"Krum's one decent player, Ireland has got seven," said Charlie shortly, and again with the dismissive hand wave. "I wish England had got through. That was embarrassing, that was."

"What happened?" asked Harry, regretting his summer of isolation just a little.

"Went down to Transylvania, three hundred and ninety to ten," said Charlie gloomily taking a quick swig from his wineglass. "Shocking performance. And Wales lost to Uganda, and Scotland was slaughtered by Luxembourg."

Harryhad a passion for flying. He had been on the Gryffindor House Quidditch team ever since his first year at Hogwarts and owned one of the best racing brooms in the world, a Firebolt. Flying came more naturally to Harry than anything else in the magical world, so naturally when he got drawn into a debate about flying with Charlie, who was as knowledgable as you could wish about all things Quidditch related, the time flew past without his ever noticing.

Neville had to nudge him pointedly out of it a good forty-five minutes later when Mrs. Weasley came out with the dessert.

Mr. Weasley conjured up candles to light the darkening garden before they had their homemade strawberry ice cream, and by the time they had finished, moths were fluttering low over the table, and the warm air was perfumed with the smells of grass and honeysuckle. Harry was feeling extremely well fed and at peace with the world as he watched several gnomes sprinting through the rosebushes, laughing madly and closely pursued by Crookshanks.

Ron looked carefully up the table to check that the rest of the family were all busy talking, then he said very quietly to Harry, "So – have you heard from Sirius lately?"

Hermione looked around, listening closely.

"Yeah," said Harry softly, "A couple of times. He sounds okay. I wrote to him a few days ago to let him know I was headed back to England. He might write back while I'm here, but I think it's more likely he'll wait until we get back to Hogwarts. Speaking of," Harry said, remembering suddenly, "I had this really odd dream a few nights ago—"

"Look at the time," Mrs. Weasley said suddenly, checking her wristwatch. "You really should be in bed, the whole lot of you! You'll be up at the crack of dawn to get to the Cup. Harry, if you leave your school list out, I'll get your things for you tomorrow in Diagon Alley. I'm getting everyone else's. There might not be time after the World Cup. The match went on for five days last time."

"That's alright Mrs. Weasley, I got my stuff a while back, it's all packed and everything. But really, five days! I hope it goes on that long this time. Imagine it. Five days of Quidditch!"

"Well, I certainly hope it doesn't," said Percy sanctimoniously. "I shudder to think what the state of my in-tray would be if I was away from work for five days."

"Yeah, someone might slip dragon dung in it again, eh, Perce?" said Fred.

"That was a sample of fertilizer from Norway!" said Percy, going very red in the face. "It was nothing personal!"

"It was," Fred whispered to Harry leaning over his shoulder with a wicked grin as they got up from the table. "We sent it."

* * *

**AN: **Hey guys, welcome to the end of chapter two! Now as you may or may not know depending on whether or not you read my author's notes, this thing is due in Feb! Feedback and suggestions are not only welcome but they are desperately needed! So please tell me what you think and or things you'd like to see when you drop off your reviews!


	3. Chapter 3

**WARNING: It's Complicated**

**Chapter Three: Portkeys and Tents**

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Harry Potter

**Author's Note: **Thanks to everyone who took the time to read, review, alert and/or fave, you guys rock! There's more canon text in here than I'd like but I expect to be diverging more and more as we get going, well at least it makes this chappie nice and long. Please enjoy!

* * *

It felt like Harry had just drifted off when Mrs. Weasley shook him awake. Murmuring an incoherent protest he turned away from her burrowing into the warmth that was Neville, who continued to snore on loudly and obliviously.

"Oh honestly," huffed Mrs. Weasley.

She waved her wand and there was the sudden, annoying, ringing of bells that had all the boys sitting up with sleepy glares.

"Up you get boys or you'll miss your portkey," she said unsympathetically.

"S'it time already?" yawned Fred.

With jerky movements Ron and the twins rolled out of bed and began getting dressed. Harry dug around in his satchel until he came up with a clean set of clothes and dressed quickly with his customary lack of finesse. He brushed out his hair and yanked it up into his, now customary, high ponytail fiddling absently with his fringe while he waited for the others to be ready.

While he was fiddling he watched Neville change in the reflective surface of Ron's aquarium and tried not to feel like a total perv for doing it. The round-faced boy had really grown over the course of the summer. He'd shot up a good four inches and lost all the pudginess of pre-pubescence. Green eyes followed the curve of his neck, mostly obscured by the hint of curl in is over-long brown hair, tracing over the shadow of the collar bone and the curve of the spine. He bit down hard on his lower lip as his eyes dropped to the waistband of the low riding pajama pants that highlighted the jut of the hipbones and the line of hair that ran from just under his navel down to parts unknown. The long legs were just icing on the cake as far as Harry was concerned.

He sighed a bit to himself. How come all the good ones were either taken, straight or both? Removing himself from temptation Harry moved into the bathroom down the hall to brush his teeth.

"Morning, Gin, you sleep okay?"

All Harry got from Ginny, who was still in her dressing gown and was scrubbing over her front teeth in a slow hypnotic up down motion, was a grunt. Needless to say Harry was out of the bathroom before her and so were the rest of the boys.

Yawning and still mostly asleep they trudged downstairs for breakfast.

In the kitchen Mrs. Weasley was briskly stirring the contents of a large pot on the stove, while Mr. Weasley was sitting at the table, checking a sheaf of large parchment tickets. He looked up as the boys entered and spread his arms so that they could see his clothes more clearly. He was wearing what appeared to be a golfing sweater and a very old pair of jeans, slightly too big for him and held up with a thick leather belt.

"What d'you think?" he asked anxiously. "We're supposed to go incognito - do I look like a Muggle, Harry?"

"Yeah," said Harry, smiling and flashing him a thumbs up, "Very good."

Actually the Weasleys and Neville had all done a pretty good job of looking muggles, all of them fairly uniformly dressed in jeans and jumpers. Harry felt a bit out of place actually in straight legged khaki Bermuda shorts that fell just past his knees, brown dragonhide combat boots, and a beat-up green hoodie.

"Where're Bill and Charlie and Per-Per-Percy?" said George, failing to stifle a huge yawn.

"Well, they're apparating, aren't they?" said Mrs. Weasley, heaving the large pot over to the table and starting to ladle porridge into bowls. "So they can have a bit of a lie-in."

"So they're still in bed?" said Fred grumpily, pulling his bowl of porridge toward him. "Why can't we apparate too?"

"Because you're not of age and you haven't passed your test," snapped Mrs. Weasley. "And where have those girls got to?"

She bustled out of the kitchen and they heard her climbing the stairs.

"I can't wait until we can get our licences," said George, "We're almost seventeen, now."

"Yeah, then there'd be none of this portkey at dawn nonsense," grumbled Fred around a mouthful of porridge.

"I hear that apparation is really difficult," Neville said moving his porridge around with his spoon more than eating it.

"Oh yes," said Mr. Weasley, tucking the tickets safely into the back pocket of his jeans. "The Department of Magical Transportation had to fine a couple of people the other day for apparating without a license. It's not easy at all, apparition, and when it's not done property it can lead to nasty complications. This pair I'm talking about went and splinched themselves."

Everyone around the table winced.

"They left half of themselves behind," said Mr. Weasley, mostly for Harry's benefit, now spooning large amounts of treacle onto his porridge. "So, of course, they were stuck. Couldn't move either way. Had to wait for the Accidental Magic Reversal Squad to sort them out. Meant a fair old bit of paperwork, I can tell you, what with the muggles who spotted the body parts they'd left behind."

"Were they okay?" Harry asked, handing over his toast to Neville since it seemed the boy didn't like porridge but was too embarrassed to say so.

"Oh yes," said Mr. Weasley matter-of-factly as Neville flashed Harry a grateful smile and tucked in on the toast, "But they got a heavy fine, and I don't think they'll be trying it again in a hurry. You don't mess around with apparition. There are plenty of adult wizards who don't bother with it. Prefer brooms - slower, but safer."

"But Bill and Charlie and Percy can all do it?"

"Charlie had to take the test twice," said Fred, grinning. "He failed the first time. He apparated five miles south of where he meant to, right on top of some poor old dear doing her shopping, remember?"

"Yeah, that was right brilliant, that was."

"Yes, well, he passed the second time," said Mrs. Weasley, marching back into the kitchen amid the hearty sniggers at Charlie's expense.

"Percy only passed two weeks ago," said George. "He's been apparating downstairs every morning since, just to prove he can."

"Like you two wouldn't do exactly the same thing," snorted Harry taking a large spoonful of porridge.

"True," agreed George.

"But we'd do it with style and panache," said Fred.

There were footsteps down the passageway and Hermione and Ginny came into the kitchen, both dressed in jeans and warm sweaters but still looking pale and drowsy.

"Why do we have to be up so early?" Ginny said darkly, rubbing her eyes and sitting down at the table.

"We've got a bit of a walk," said Mr. Weasley.

"Walk?" said Harry. "What, are we walking to the World Cup? I thought we were taking a portkey."

"No, no, good gracious no, we are most certainly taking a portkey. The World Cup is miles away," said Mr. Weasley, smiling. "We only need to walk a short way. It's just that it's very difficult for a large number of wizards to congregate without attracting undue muggle attention. We have to be very careful about how we travel at the best of times, and on a huge occasion like the Quidditch World Cup—"

"George!" said Mrs. Weasley sharply, and they all jumped.

"What?" said George, in an innocent tone that didn't fool anybody.

"What is that in your pocket?"

"Nothing!"

"Don't you dare lie to me George Fabian Weasley!" Mrs. Weasley said in a dangerous voice.

She pointed her wand at George's pocket and said, "Accio!"

Several small, brightly colored objects zoomed out of George's pocket. He made a grab for them but missed, and they sped right into Mrs. Weasley's outstretched hand.

"We told you to destroy them!" said Mrs. Weasley furiously, holding up a fistful of what were unmistakably the jinxed candies that Ginny and Ron had been explaining about yesterday. "We told you to get rid of the lot! Empty your pockets! Go on! Both of you!"

It was an unpleasant scene. The twins had evidently been trying to smuggle as many of their inventions out of the house as possible, and it was only by using her Summoning Charm that Mrs. Weasley managed to find them all. If indeed she _had_ managed to find them all.

"Accio! Accio! Accio!" she shouted, and candies zoomed from all sorts of unlikely places, including the lining of George's jacket and the turn-ups of Fred's jeans.

"We spent six months developing those!" Fred shouted at his mother as she threw the brightly wrapped trick sweets away.

"Oh a fine way to spend six months!" she shrieked. "No wonder you didn't get more O.W.L.s!"

That set the twins fuming quicker than anything else but they seemed to know better than to start a full on screaming match over the breakfast table on the day of the Quidditch World Cup. Still, the rest of breakfast passed in near silence.

All in all, the atmosphere was tense as they took their leave a little later. Mrs. Weasley was still glowering as she kissed Mr. Weasley on the cheek, though not nearly as much as the twins, who had each hoisted their rucksacks onto their backs and walked out without a word to her.

"Well, have a lovely time," said Mrs. Weasley, "And behave yourselves!" she called after the twins' retreating backs, but they did not look back or answer.

She sighed heavily.

"Give them a bit dear, they'll come around," said Mr. Weasley.

Mrs. Weasley nodded.

"Yes, of course you're right Arthur, I just…" she trailed off shaking her head, "I'll send Bill, Charlie, and Percy along around midday."

Mr. Weasley gave her arm a squeeze and they set off across the dark yard after Fred and George who were already halfway down the drive.

It was chilly and the moon was still out. Only the dull, greenish glow of false dawn along the horizon to their right showed that daybreak was drawing closer. Mist lingered in the dips between hills and the dawn chorus was just getting started. Harry's finger's twitched and he started chewing on the end of his thumbnail, he could really use a cigarette but he knew how well that would go over with Hermione and resisted the urge to reach for the carton in his satchel.

"So how does everyone get there without all the muggles noticing?" Harry asked, as much because he was interested as because it would serve to break the silence that had fallen over what should have been a merry group and distract him from his nicotine cravings, "You were saying earlier something about having to walk to the portkey because it's difficult to ferry all the wizards around without the muggles noticing."

"It's been a massive organizational problem," sighed Mr. Weasley. "The trouble is, about a hundred thousand wizards turn up at the World Cup, and of course, we just haven't got a magical site big enough to accommodate them all. There are places muggles can't penetrate, but imagine trying to pack a hundred thousand wizards into Diagon Alley or platform nine and three-quarters. So we had to find a nice deserted moor, and set up as many anti-muggle precautions as possible. The whole Ministry's been working on it for months. First, of course, we have to stagger the arrivals. People with cheaper tickets have to arrive two weeks beforehand. A limited number use muggle transport, but we can't have too many clogging up their buses and trains - remember, wizards are coming from all over the world. Some apparate, of course, but we have to set up safe points for them to appear, well away from muggles. I believe there's a handy wood they're using as the apparition point. For those who don't want to apparate, or can't, we use portkeys of course, but we want to do large groups at a time as much as possible to keep the paperwork and confusion down to a minimum. There have been two hundred portkeys placed at strategic points around Britain, and the nearest one to us is up at the top of Stoatshead Hill, so that's where we're headed."

Mr. Weasley pointed ahead of them, where a large black mass rose beyond the still silent village of Ottery St. Catchpole. Only the bakery had smoke rising from the chimney.

They trudged down the dark, dank lane toward the village, the silence broken only by their footsteps. The sky lightened very slowly as they made their way through the village, its inky blackness diluting to deepest blue.

Mr. Weasley kept checking his watch.

Stoatshead Hill wasn't hugely steep and Harry, who'd spent the summer trekking through the wilds of Albania, had no problems with the climb. He was the only one.

The Weasleys, Neville and Hermione didn't have breath to spare for talking as they began to climb Stoatshead Hill, stumbling occasionally in hidden rabbit holes, slipping on thick black tufts of dewy grass. Harry stuck close to Neville, who it seemed had a sixth sense for finding every bump, divot and slippery bit of the path and was panting heavily with every breath, and tried to keep him from tumbling back down the hill.

All in all Harry was just as glad as the rest of them when his feet found level ground.

"Whew," panted Mr. Weasley, taking off his glasses and wiping them on his sweater. "Well, we've made good time - we've got ten minutes."

Hermione came over the crest of the hill last, clutching a stitch in her side.

"Alright there, Mione?"

"I…hate…you," she panted, leaning heavily on her knees as she tried to suck in more air and glaring.

"Now we just need the portkey," said Mr. Weasley, replacing his glasses and squinting around at the ground. "It won't be big, come on. Harry you'll know what to look for, right? Molly said you were portkeying all over Albania this summer."

"Yeah, I've got a good idea," said Harry scanning the hill for anything that looked even remotely like it might be a portkey.

The trouble with pre-set portkeys like this one was that they had to be things that muggles wouldn't think to pick up, like garbage or something but it also couldn't be too well hidden or the wizard it was intended for would bypass it entirely. Harry thought the Albanian magical council had the right idea sending pendant portkeys to the ones they were meant to be transporting days or weeks in advance.

They spread out, searching. They had only been at it for a couple of minutes, however, when a shout rent the still air.

"Over here, Arthur! Over here, son! I've got it."

Two tall figures were silhouetted against the starry sky on the other side of the hilltop.

"Amos!" said Mr. Weasley, smiling as he strode over to the man who had shouted.

The rest of them followed. Mr. Weasley was shaking hands with a ruddy-faced wizard with handsome features that were somewhat obscured by his scrubby brown beard. He was holding a moldy-looking old boot in his other hand and Harry immediately recognized that this would be the portkey as the most obvious, out of place bit of rotten garbage around.

"This is Amos Diggory, everyone," said Mr. Weasley. "He works for the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures. And I think you know his son, Cedric?"

Cedric Diggory was an extremely handsome boy of around seventeen with dark blond hair dressed in tan colored slacks and a blue button down shirt. The consummate good guy he was impossible not to like. He was also Captain and Seeker of the Hufflepuff House Quidditch team at Hogwarts and the only person to have beaten Harry to the snitch even if he had some help from about a dozen unwitting dementors.

"Hi," said Cedric, looking around at them all and flashing a, frankly devastating, half-smile.

Everybody said hi back except Fred and George, who merely nodded. They had never quite forgiven Cedric for beating Harry and as a consequence their team, Gryffindor, in the first quidditch match of the previous year.

"Long walk, Arthur?" Cedric's father asked.

"Not too bad," said Mr. Weasley. "We live just on the other side of the village there. You?"

"Had to get up at two, didn't we, Ced? I tell you, I'll be glad when he's passed his apparition test. Still, not complaining, I mean it's the Quidditch World Cup, wouldn't miss it for a sackful of Galleons - and the tickets cost about that. Mind you, looks like I got off easy." Amos Diggory peered good-naturedly around at the three Weasley boys, Harry, Neville, Hermione, and Ginny, "Good lord. Are all these children yours, Arthur?"

"Oh no, only the redheads," said Mr. Weasley with a laugh, pointing out his children, "This is Hermione, friend of Ron's, of course you'll recognize Neville – and Harry, another friend –"

"Merlin's beard," said Amos Diggory, his eyes widening. "Harry? Harry Potter?"

"Er - yeah," said Harry.

Harry was used to people looking curiously at him when they met him, used to the way their eyes moved at once to the lightning scar on his forehead, but it always made him feel uncomfortable and annoyed. Sure enough, Mr. Diggory's eyes flicked up to his forehead and Harry took a certain amount of satisfaction in the knowledge that his scar was well hidden behind the curtain of his swooping fringe.

"Ced's talked about you, of course," said Amos Diggory, "Told us all about playing against you last year... I said to him, I said - Ced, that'll be something to tell your grandchildren, that will. You beat Harry Potter!"

Harry couldn't think of any reply to this that didn't make him look like a sore loser or an asshole, so he remained silent. Fred and George were both scowling again. Cedric looked slightly embarrassed.

"Harry fell off his broom, Dad," he muttered, flushing up to his ears at the death glares he was receiving from all sides, "I told you. It was an accident."

"Yes, but you didn't fall off, did you?" roared Amos genially, slapping his son on his back. "Always modest, our Ced, always the gentleman, but the best man won, I'm sure Harry'd say the same, wouldn't you, eh? One falls off his broom, one stays on; you don't need to be a genius to tell which one's the better flier!"

"Conveniently forgetting to factor the swarm of dementors into the equation of course," said Hermione coolly, crossing her arms over her chest.

"Harry could fly circles around anyone at Hogwarts," agreed Neville staunchly.

"Too right," chorused the Twins.

"I can also part the Red Sea and leap tall buildings in a single bound," said Harry with an eye roll.

That got a chuckle out of Hermione and earned him confused looks from the Weasleys and Neville.

"C'mon guys, leave off, it's not like it was Cedric's fault we lost the match."

"Yeah but it wasn't your fault either," grumbled George.

"And you can't just go start something with a bunch of dementors, you know?" added Fred.

Amos Diggory didn't seem to know what to say, though he opened his mouth a few time as though he was trying to say something.

"Must be nearly time," said Mr. Weasley quickly, pulling out his watch again. "Do you know whether we're waiting for any more, Amos?"

"No, the Lovegoods have been there for a week already, Xeno said something about Hibbering Flitterjibbets, and the Fawcetts couldn't get tickets," said Mr. Diggory, allowing himself to be distracted. "There aren't any more of us in this area, are there?"

"Not that I know of," said Mr. Weasley. "Yes, it's a minute off. We'd better get ready. Gather round everyone, make sure you're touching the portkey."

With difficulty, owing to their bulky backpacks, the ten of them crowded around the old boot held out by Amos Diggory and touched a finger to the gritty old leather. They all stood there, in a tight circle, as a chill breeze swept over the hilltop. Nobody spoke. Harry was glad that it was the crack of dawn because any muggles that caught sight of this nonsense would think they were all idiots huddling together around a manky old boot.

"Three..." muttered Mr. Weasley, one eye still on his watch, "Two...one..."

It happened immediately: Harry felt as though a hook just behind his navel had been suddenly jerked irresistibly forward. His feet left the ground; he could feel Ron and Hermione on either side of him, their shoulders banging into his. They were all speeding forward in an all too familiar and faintly nauseating howl of wind and swirling color. His forefinger was stuck to the boot and it was pulling him almost magnetically onward and then—his feet slammed into the ground. He took a couple of hopping steps forward to recover his balance and get out of the way.

Ron staggered into Neville and they both toppled over. The portkey hit the ground with a heavy thud.

Harry looked around. Mr. Weasley, Mr. Diggory, and Cedric were still standing, though looking very windswept; everybody else was on the ground.

"Good landing Harry, that's the trick of it!" said Mr. Weasley grinning broadly.

"You didn't see the first dozen or so landings," Harry pointed out with a self-depreciating grin, "Ooh and my portkey home. That was embarrassing. I was hanging over a branch in a tree when it activated and I landed face first in the arrival room."

He conveniently left out the fact that he'd been shooting at zombies. If the Weasleys thought he was doing dangerous stuff like living in the Black Forest in a tent up to his elbows in computer guts, sleeping with random half-vampires, experimenting with volatile potions and being chased by zombies they would never agree not to tattle on him to Dumbledore or Fudge and drag him back to the Dursleys. No as far as everyone was concerned he'd taken a learning vacation to talk to Professor Eckenwalder about his magitek theories and tour the wizarding communities in Eastern Europe.

"Seven past five from Stoatshead Hill," called a voice, interrupting Harry's thoughts.

In front of them was a pair of tired and grumpy-looking wizards, one of whom was holding a large gold watch, the other a thick roll of parchment and a quill. Both were dressed as Muggles, though very inexpertly: The man with the watch wore a tweed suit with thigh length galoshes; his colleague, a kilt and a poncho.

Harry really didn't understand the difficulty most purebloods had with dressing like muggles. Sure the styles were a bit different but trousers and a button down shirt, the base of the Hogwarts uniform, were perfectly acceptable in the muggle world, if a bit out of place in a campground.

"Morning, Basil," said Mr. Weasley, picking up the boot and handing it to the kilted wizard, who threw it into a large box of used Portkeys beside him. Harry could see an old newspaper, an empty drinks can, and a punctured football.

"Hello there, Arthur," said Basil wearily. "Not on duty, eh? It's all right for some. We've been here all night. You'd better get out of the way, we've got a big party coming in from the Black Forest at five fifteen."

"Without a full screening?" asked Harry arching a brow, "That's rare."

Basil nodded at Harry.

"You're right about that lad, dangerous too if you asked me, not that anyone did. Well, the group's a bunch of big wigs from the Eastern European League of something or another so they managed to clear it with the higher ups in the Ministry."

"Honestly, they're just begging for an incident," Harry said shaking his head.

"Yes, well, if anything happens I'll be the first to say I told you so but for now," he shrugged helplessly, "Hang on, I'll find your campsite. Weasley...Weasley..."

He consulted his parchment list.

"Ah, here we are, Weasley. About a quarter of a mile's walk over there, first field you come to. Site manager's called Mr. Roberts. Diggory, second field. Ask for Mr. Payne."

"Thanks, Basil," said Mr. Weasley, and he beckoned everyone to follow him.

They set off across the deserted moor, unable to make out much through the mist.

"What was that all about mate?" asked Ron the moment they were out of earshot.

"What do you mean?" asked Harry pretending to fiddle with the strap on his bag.

"Don't play coy Harry," Hermione scolded, "Though I have to say I'm surprised too. I wouldn't have thought you'd pay attention to the history of the Black Forest."

"What do you mean?" demanded Ron.

"Honestly Ronald," Hermione sighed, "How you can know so little about your own history is beyond me."

"You mean Vidiar Corvus, right?" Cedric interjected, "The last real necromancer."

"Exactly," said Hermione with a nod, "His family and vassals were the ones who did the better part of the anti-muggle warding in Albania. The whole tract of land on which the forest sits is hidden from them."

"Which is really rather fortunate seeing as how the forest has a large population of zombies, and hosts three vampire covens and a pack of feral werewolves," Harry put in.

"Wasn't Corvus the wizard who made the thing that made the vampires and such," said Ron frowning.

"That's right," agreed Neville, "His family died of plague and when he tried to permanently revive them they came back but they weren't the same. His wife a walking corpse who ate the flesh from his bones, his daughter thirsting for blood to sustain her, and his young son, not yet dead but mutated by the plague and the dark magic into an enormous wolf."

"Such morbid talk," muttered Amos, looking uncomfortable.

"Oh but it's fascinating!" said Hermione, "Muggles know a great deal more about viruses and pathogens than they did before and I've done a great deal of research. My pet theory is that when a muggle strain of the plague mutated and was able to affect wizards it took on magical characteristics including the near sentience that drives, for instance, enchanted objects. The virus is more alive than a muggle counterpart and it is the viral impulse to spread that causes the destructive behaviours in werewolves, vampires, and zombies."

"Is that so? Extraordinary, Hermione," said Arthur, looking positively dazzled by the information.

"Could you make like a zombie anti-viral though?" said Harry skeptically.

"Well, obviously you don't know until you try but with zombies I suspect it would be more a case of catching the infection before it killed the host. It's the applications for werewolves and vampires that I would be interested in."

After about twenty minutes, a small stone cottage next to a gate swam into view. Beyond it, Harry could just make out the ghostly shapes of hundreds and hundreds of tents, rising up the gentle slope of a large field toward a dark wood on the horizon. They said good-bye to the Diggorys and approached the cottage door.

A man was standing in the doorway, looking out at the tents. Harry knew at a glance that this was the only real muggle for several acres. When he heard their footsteps, he turned his head to look at them.

"Morning!" said Mr. Weasley brightly.

"Morning," said the man.

"Would you be Mr. Roberts?"

"Aye, I would," said Mr. Roberts. "And who're you?"

"Weasley - two tents, booked a couple of days ago?"

"Aye," said Mr. Roberts, consulting a list tacked to the door. "You've got a space up by the wood there. Just the one night?"

"That's it," said Mr. Weasley.

"You'll be paying now, then?" said Mr. Roberts.

"Ah – right – certainly," said Mr. Weasley.

He retreated a short distance from the cottage and beckoned Harry toward him.

"Help me, Harry," he muttered, pulling a roll of Muggle money from his pocket and starting to peel the notes apart.

"This one's a – a – a ten? Ah yes, I see the little number on it now... So this is a five?"

"A twenty," Harry corrected him, "Here, let me," he offered, uncomfortably aware of Mr. Robert watching them.

"Ah yes, that might be best, I don't know, these little bits of paper—"

"You foreign?" said Mr. Roberts as Harry handed over a few notes.

"Foreign?" repeated Mr. Weasley, puzzled.

"You're not the first one who's had trouble with money," said Mr. Roberts, scrutinizing Mr. Weasley closely. "I had two try and pay me with great gold coins the size of hubcaps ten minutes ago."

"Did you really?" said Mr. Weasley nervously.

"That's odd," said Harry blithely, "Nah, we're all brits, Uncle Arthur's just got bad eyes."

"That a fact? Well, keep out of the deep woods then, it's easy to get turned around, 'specially when the mist is thick."

Mr. Roberts rummaged around in a tin for some change.

"There you are lad. Your change."

"You know, it's never been this crowded out here," he said suddenly, looking out over the misty field again. "Hundreds of pre-bookings. People usually just turn up. It's strange."

"Is that right?" said Mr. Weasley.

"Aye," he said thoughtfully. "People coming in from all over. Loads of foreigners. And not just foreigners. Weirdos, you know? There's a bloke walking 'round in a kilt and a poncho."

"Shouldn't he?" said Mr. Weasley anxiously.

"It's like some sort of...I dunno...like some sort of rally," said Mr. Roberts. "They all seem to know each other. Like a big party."

At that moment, a wizard in plus-fours appeared out of thin air next to Mr. Roberts's front door.

"Obliviate!" he said sharply, pointing his wand at Mr. Roberts.

Instantly, Mr. Roberts's eyes slid out of focus, his brows unknitted, and a look of dreamy unconcern fell over his face. Harry recognized the symptoms of one who had just had his memory modified and frowned a bit. Memory modification was, if you asked Harry, whose last experience with the charm had resulted in the complete erasure of a professor's memory, a bit too delicate to be casting it on muggles so easily.

"A map of the campsite for you," Mr. Roberts said placidly to Mr. Weasley.

"Thanks very much," said Mr. Weasley.

The wizard in plus-fours accompanied them toward the gate to the campsite. He looked exhausted: His chin was blue with stubble and there were deep purple shadows under his eyes.

Once out of earshot of Mr. Roberts, he muttered to Mr. Weasley, "Been having a lot of trouble with him. Needs a Memory Charm ten times a day to keep him happy. And Ludo Bagman's not helping. Trotting around talking about bludgers and quaffles at the top of his voice, not a worry about anti-Muggle security Blimey, I'll be glad when this is over. See you later, Arthur."

He disapparated.

"I thought Mr. Bagman was Head of Magical Games and Sports," said Ginny, looking surprised. "He should know better than to talk about bludgers near muggles, shouldn't he?"

"He should," said Mr. Weasley, smiling, and leading them through the gates into the campsite, "but Ludo's always been a bit, well, lax about security. You couldn't wish for a more enthusiastic head of the sports department though. He played Quidditch for England himself, you know. And he was the best Beater the Wimbourne Wasps ever had."

They trudged up the misty field between long rows of tents. Most looked almost ordinary; their owners had clearly tried to make them as Muggle-like as possible, but had slipped up by adding chimneys, or bellpulls, or weather vanes. However, here and there was a tent so obviously magical that Harry could hardly be surprised that Mr. Roberts was getting suspicious.

Halfway up the field stood an extravagant confection of striped silk like a miniature palace, with several live peacocks tethered at the entrance. One edge of the tent flap was open and Harry could have sworn that he caught a flash of Lucius Malfoy's long blond hair. He wouldn't have been at all surprised.

A little farther on they passed a tent that had three floors and several turrets; and a short way beyond that was a tent that had a front garden attached, complete with birdbath, sundial, and fountain.

"Always the same," said Mr. Weasley, smiling. "We can't resist showing off when we get together. Ah, here we are, look, this is us."

They had reached the very edge of the wood at the top of the field, and here was an empty space, with a small sign hammered into the ground that read WEEZLY.

"Couldn't have a better spot!" said Mr. Weasley happily. "The field is just on the other side of the wood there, we're as close as we could be." He hoisted his backpack from his shoulders. "Right," he said excitedly, "no magic allowed, strictly speaking, not when we're out in these numbers on muggle land."

"Not that that really seems to be stopping anyone," said Harry with a snort.

"Yes, well, we're going to be the ones setting a good example. We'll be putting these tents up by hand! Shouldn't be too difficult. Muggles do it all the time. Here, Harry, where do you reckon we should start?"

Mr. Weasley had managed to get his hands on a shabby set of magical tents and Harry, who'd learned how to set up and take down his own tent without even looking had them both up in minutes with some help from Hermione here and there. Mr. Weasley tried to help too but ended up being more of a hindrance as he got far too excited about using the small mallet to hammer the pegs into the ground. Harry stood back and surveyed his handiwork with a nod. Nobody looking at these tents would guess they belonged to wizards.

"That was pretty quick Harry," complimented Neville, "Do you go camping often?"

"Actually before this summer I'd never been, the Dursleys aren't camping people," said Harry, and even if they had been camping people they would have shunted Harry off on Mrs. Figg, "I did a lot of camping in Albania though because it was easier and cheaper than finding hostels or hotels to stay in every night."

"Wow Harry," said Hermione, "You really got around this summer didn't you?"

"Of course, I was free of the Dursleys. I honestly can't believe I didn't do this kind of thing sooner."

"Let's see what they're like on the inside," said Mr. Weasley.

He dropped to his hands and knees and entered the first tent.

"Well of course they look good," said Hermione shooting Harry a quizzical look, "But still we won't all fit."

"We'll be a bit cramped," he called, "but I think we'll all squeeze in. Come and have a look."

"The tents are enchanted Mione," Ron explained, "Just because they don't look all fancy on the outside doesn't mean that there aren't expansion charms and things."

Hermione flushed watching Ron and the twins crawl in.

"I should have guessed that," she huffed to herself, annoyed.

"Just go in," said Ginny giving her a nudge with her hip and an encouraging grin, "I want to see the look on your face."

Hermione huffed again but dropped to her knees and crawled through the tent flap with Ginny hot on her heels. Harry followed them; curious to see what the insides of the tent looked like.

He walked into what looked like an old-fashioned, three-room flat, complete with bathroom and kitchen. Oddly enough, it was furnished in exactly the same sort of style as Mrs. Figg's house. There were crocheted covers on the mismatched chairs and a strong smell of cats.

"Well, it's not for long," said Mr. Weasley, mopping his bald patch with a handkerchief and peering in at the four bunk beds that stood in the bedroom. I borrowed this from Perkins at the office. Doesn't camp much anymore, poor fellow, he's got lumbago."

"Dad there's no way there's enough room for us all to sleep here, not unless the girls share with some of us," Fred pointed out.

He was right, with eleven people, nine of them boys someone was going to be stuck on the lumpy old sofa.

"Well, I have my tent with me," said Harry, "It's a bit smaller than this one but Ron and Nev can share with me. I doubt anyone will care that we have one extra as long as we stay on our plot."

"Alright," agreed Mr. Weasley easily, "That'll give everyone some breathing room at least."

He picked up the dusty kettle and peered inside it.

"We'll need water."

"There's a tap marked on this map the muggle gave us," said Ron, "It's on the other side of the field."

"Well, why don't you, Neville, Harry, and Hermione go and get us some water then," Mr. Weasley handed over the kettle and a couple of saucepans, "And the rest of us will get some wood for a fire?"

"But we've got an oven," said Ron. "Why can't we just –"

"Ron, anti-muggle security!" said Mr. Weasley, his face shining with anticipation. "When real muggles camp, they cook on fires outdoors. I've seen them at it!"

After a quick tour of the girls' tent, which was slightly smaller than the boys', though without the smell of cats, Harry, quickly set up his tent and let Ron and Neville dump their rucksacks in his living room. Then the three Gryffindor boys and Hermione set off across the campsite with their arms full of empty kettles and saucepans.

* * *

**AN: **Yeah, so, you know how this thing was meant to be due in February...well the competition thread kind of died and I lost my motivation and yeah...anyway I haven't abandoned this story but it will probably be slow going as far as updates are concerned. The follow/alert button is your friend...

Anyway, please leave a review and let me know what you guys think!


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